Melodrama in Fantasy, and When Emotion is Excessive
(As seen in Berserk)
Kentaro Miura's seinen manga Berserk (ベルセルク） has received considerable praise since its serialization began in 1992 for building a realistic world within a (comparatively dark) high fantasy setting. Particularly, with respect to Miura's talent for creating dark stories that are fantastical in scope with characters who, despite the altogether unreality of their struggles, are able to nevertheless elicit powerful emotional responses from the reader. It seems like it would be no simple task to attempt to view Berserk through the lens of melodrama as we have classified it throughout the semester. Largely, the stories that appear within films and novels in this class have been grounded firmly in reality, allowing the over-the-top nature of their characters to contrast with their more mundane settings -- ultimately creating the melodramatic tone within a particular work. I believe that a similar contrast exists within Berserk, and that because of the heightened unreality of the story, the reactions of the characters must be even more unrealistic when viewed alongside it to instill emotions similar to those given by more grounded stories. In short, I believe that a setting being realistic is not necessary to melodrama, but rather that the more unrealistic the setting, the greater the contrast there must be between emotional unreality and unreality within the setting. Further, there is an interesting conflict between the first part of the story and the rest of it with respect to tragedy and melodrama.
Background: "The Golden Age" Arc
The first part of Berserk (called the "Golden Age Arc") has a low fantasy setting wherein two countries --Midland and Tudor-- have been at war with each other for over one-hundred years. Berserk is a story about a man named Guts who, orphaned at birth, was adopted by a bandit named Gambino and raised as a mercenary. Here, Guts learns how to fight and survive, but ultimately kills his adoptive father after he learns that Gambino permitted one of his soldiers to sexually abuse a younger Guts. From here, Guts travels the realm as a lone mercenary until after a battle he is noticed by a commander of the opposing forces, General of the Band of Hawk, Griffith. After the battle, Griffith's men set upon a lone Guts (whether on Griffith's orders or of their own volition its not terribly clear), but Guts kills all of them. Before slaying one of Griffith's captains, Casca, Griffith himself intervenes. Commenting on Guts's skill, he asks Guts to join him and his Band. Guts declines and attempts to slay Griffith, but is mortally wounded. After he recovers, Griffith asks again for him to join, saying he wants him (Casca notes Griffith has never been so keenly interested in someone prior), and tells him of his dream to have a kingdom of his own (which is why he fights). This time, Guts presents Griffith with an option: defeat him again and he'll join, or lose and die. Griffith defeats Guts, and declares that he belongs to him now.
Guts joins him, and through their many battles together, come to trust one another. Eventually, Griffith and his band's many victories for Midland lead to him becoming a low-rank noble. Griffith, who was born a commoner, is not liked by other nobles, and an attempt on his life is made. In response, Griffith has Guts assassinate the noble who perpetrated it. Guts is ordered to leave no witnesses alive, and as a result he accidentally kills the noble's child as well -- an event which leaves Guts visibly distressed. Guts returns to report back to Griffith, but overhears him in conversation with the Princess of Midland saying that, though thankful for their help, he would never consider any of his Band friends or equals, as they are merely helping him achieve his dream. Guts, dejected, walks away. Nevertheless, Guts continues to assist Griffith as captain of his raiders in taking back a pivotal location for Midland, which sees Griffith attaining the rank of General in the army. After this, Guts resolves to leave the Band of Hawk. Griffith cannot have this, and challenges Guts to a duel like he did three years prior, only this time his sword is quickly broken, and Guts leaves.
Griffith, in his shock, sneaks into the Princess's room and has sex with her, but is seen by the maid and sentenced to eternal torture by the King of Midland and locked away; his Band to be killed as well. Eventually, surviving members of the Band led by Casca team up with Guts a year later and rescue an all but dead Griffith. Griffith is so injured that he will never fight again, and thus will never achieve his dream. In his despair, he attempts to kill himself, but instead activates an artifact called a Behelit that summons him and his comrades to a supernatural realm wherein four demons give him a choice: Sacrifice his men and be reborn in order to attain his dream, or die. Griffith decides to sacrifice his men who are all eaten by demons. All except for Guts and Casca. Griffith has decided that his dream was broken because Guts left (or in his words, "You were the only one who made me forget my dream."), thus Griffith wants to visit on Guts as much pain as possible before killing him. To this end, he forces himself on Casca (who has established a relationship with Guts at this point) and forces Guts to watch. An enraged Guts cuts his arm of to attack the reborn Griffith (now known as Femto) in order to save Casca, but cannot get close enough to harm him in his new state. Shortly after, another supernatural being saves Guts and Casca from their fate, but not before Guts is told that he will be pursued for the rest of his days by demons because he did not die here. The story after this is one of revenge, with Guts setting out to kill his former General.
Analysis: Guts and Griffith as Tragedy and Melodrama in "The Golden Age"
During the events of "The Golden Age", the world of Berserk has yet to become suffused with magic as is the case during the events that follow it. That is, Berserk's setting has yet to become fantastical enough to the point where certain reactions that would be over-the-top in a more mundane work are no longer so here. To borrow from Halperin's interpretation of melodrama wherein it is treated as tragedy that has excess emotion for the situation, I suggest that Guts's character is an embodiment of tragedy while Griffith's is melodrama.
Guts' childhood was an undoubtedly hard one, and his abuse by the only person he had ever trusted prior to meeting Griffith weighs heavily on him both physically and emotionally. Guts has an acute fear of being touched suddenly, his lone-wolf nature is a protective strategy so he does not endure the same abuses twice. Guts's reactions later on after meeting Griffith are also realistic. When Guts is ordered to kill just a nobleman for Griffith, and accidentally kills both father and child instead, he panics. He tries to turn to the only person he believes is a true friend and equal to him, but is instead inadvertently rejected as a friend by Griffith, as he has no dream of his own. Rather than lashing out and confronting him, challenging him to a duel or whatever other such brash actions he could possibly do, he continues to assist Griffith, but considers what was said carefully -- only finally leaving once he decides to find a dream for himself so that Griffith might see him as an equal.
Griffith is the flip-side of Guts's realism.
Griffith is wholly unrealistic and fantastic within his setting in both appearance and actions. Griffith grew up in poverty, but aspired to lofty goals of owning his own kingdom some day. Notable is that all nobles we see within the Golden Age Arc frequently comment on how ridiculous it is that Griffith could rise from pauper to abject royal in only a few short years -- a sort of meta commentary on how excessive this is. To attain this end he uses his beauty to manipulate wealthy generals and nobles alike to gain money to acquire and sustain a mercenary force. The two events that cement Griffith as a melodramatic character within my mind are when he first learns Guts's success in his assassination and when Guts defeats him for the first time. When he learns that Guts was successful in his mission, he also learns that a child was killed in the process. This does not seem to matter much to Griffith, and in fact smiles. Crucially, he does not have anywhere near as visceral and regretful as Guts's. Also important to remember is that Guts has seen just as much if not more death than Griffith, but is still shocked at what he has done. Griffith's lack of remorse is excessive in order to help begin to paint Griffith as evil. The second is more powerful in analyzing Griffith as a melodramatic character. Prior to this point, he has always been in control. He has always gotten what he wanted, and with Guts's decision to leave, he does not know how to respond. Griffith attempts to understand what happened but cannot. He loses his mind with the loss of Guts, and seduces the King's daughter in order to process this. Griffith, in attempting to understand why Guts would leave, throws away all formality and etiquette, and subsequently his goals and his dream.
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